1. Field of the Invention
Example embodiments of the present invention relate to a hologram generation method and apparatus, and more particularly, to a method and apparatus for generating a wide viewing angle hologram based on an inter-viewpoint redundancy.
2. Description of the Related Art
With a recent invigoration in the three-dimensional (3D) image industry and 3D display industry, active research is being conducted on holography technology hailed as an ultimate 3D image. In the holography technology, phase information on an object may be recorded through an interference of two types of light, for example, light waves, including a reference wave and an object wave. The holography technology may be characterized in enabling a user to view a 3D image without experiencing a visual fatigue, and providing an outstanding performance in terms of, for example, a depth effect, when compared to other methods of realizing a 3D image.
Also, remarkably growing digital technology and computing technology has inspired digital holography technology to be developed in contrast to a generally used analog method. A computer-generated hologram (CGH) performing the interference of the object wave and the reference wave ensures hologram generation without using an optical method. A holographic display has an issue of a spatial light modulator (SLM) having a relatively narrow viewing angle, for example, 2° to 3° and thus, various methods have been applied to solve the issue.
As an example, since a single SLM is insufficient to view a reconstructed image through both eyes, a binocular holographic display apparatus using two SLMs has been provided. In this example, the binocular holographic display apparatus may be implemented using two SLMs to display a hologram pattern image for a left viewpoint and a hologram pattern image for a right viewpoint.
As another example, to increase a viewing angle in a horizontal direction, a holographic display system has been implemented by horizontally arranging five transmission type liquid crystal (LC)-SLMs. As still another example, a multi-SLM holographic display system has been implemented by tiling six high resolution phase-only SLMs in a 3×2 form to increase a size of hologram or a viewing angle such that a user feels comfortable while viewing a 3D image.
In the general technology for implementing a wide viewing angle hologram by configuring a plurality of SLMs in an M×N matrix form, a calculation complexity may increase in a process of generating a hologram pattern for M×N viewpoints to be represented using the SLMs although the increased size of hologram or the increased viewing angle is provided. The aforementioned phenomenon may be an issue in terms of an application requiring a real-time processing.